How to correct a while balance problem

"fredrickson" wrote in message

I took a picture in the sunlight but I had my camera white balance set for incandescent light. What would be the best technique to fix the colors? Everything is shaded blue.

For the colors: try Image>Adjustments>Photofilter or/and Image>Adjustments>Hue.

For the lights: try Image>Adjustments>Levels or Contrast/Brightness

I took a picture in the sunlight but I had my camera white balance set for incandescent light. What would be the best technique to fix the colors? Everything is shaded blue.

Image->Adjust->Curves. Exactly the sort of thing the Curves command excels at. —
Biohazard? Radiation hazard? SO last-century.
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For the colors: try Image>Adjustments>Photofilter or/and Image>Adjustments>Hue.

Image->Adjust->Hue and Saturation will not return normal color balance to an image with an overall blue cast.

For the lights: try Image>Adjustments>Levels or Contrast/Brightness

Levels can make the light areas blow out to white, but is not a good approach for an overall color cast. Brightness/Contrast should not be used *at all*–it is a "linear" command, which means it works just by shoving the histogram around. In English, what that means is that the Brightness/Contrast (and Color Balance) commands degrade image detail by clipping hilight and/or shadow detail.

For an overall color cast, Image->Adjust->Curves is most often the way to go.

—
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"Tacit" wrote in message

For the colors: try Image>Adjustments>Photofilter or/and Image>Adjustments>Hue.

Image->Adjust->Hue and Saturation will not return normal color balance to

an

image with an overall blue cast.

For the lights: try Image>Adjustments>Levels or Contrast/Brightness

Levels can make the light areas blow out to white, but is not a good

approach

for an overall color cast. Brightness/Contrast should not be used *at

all*–it

is a "linear" command, which means it works just by shoving the histogram around. In English, what that means is that the Brightness/Contrast (and

Color

Balance) commands degrade image detail by clipping hilight and/or shadow detail.

For an overall color cast, Image->Adjust->Curves is most often the way to

go.

—
Biohazard? Radiation hazard? SO last-century.
Nanohazard T-shirts now available! http://www.villaintees.com Art, literature, shareware, polyamory, kink, and more:
http://www.xeromag.com/franklin.html

Yeah, Curves are next on my list of things I want to master.

From: "fredrickson"

I took a picture in the sunlight but I had my camera white balance set for incandescent light. What would be the best technique to fix the colors? Everything is shaded blue.

If you shot in RAW (or NEF) mode you should be able to change the color balance easily with your RAW conversion software. If you shot jpegs instead now you know one (of many) reason it’s better to shoot RAW mode instead.

As the wise man Tacit said, Curves is the best tool to correct the color balance. If you have a neutral tone in the image, something either neutral gray or white, you should be able to use the ‘set white point’ or ‘set gray point’ eyedroppers at the bottom-right of the Curves (or Levels if you’re more comfortable there) dialog box to remove a global color cast.

Bill

I took a picture in the sunlight but I had my camera white balance set

for

incandescent light. What would be the best technique to fix the colors? Everything is shaded blue.

If you shot in RAW (or NEF) mode you should be able to change the color

balance

easily with your RAW conversion software. If you shot jpegs instead now

you

know one (of many) reason it’s better to shoot RAW mode instead.
As the wise man Tacit said, Curves is the best tool to correct the color balance. If you have a neutral tone in the image, something either

neutral

gray or white, you should be able to use the ‘set white point’ or ‘set

gray

point’ eyedroppers at the bottom-right of the Curves (or Levels if you’re

more

comfortable there) dialog box to remove a global color cast.

Yep, its JPG. I messed with curves a bit but I guess I need more practice. Am i just supposed to adjust the Blue channel?

Anyway here are the photos if anyone else wants to try. Its a Nikon Coolpix 2100 by the way, can it do RAW?
Is that just the 1600×1200 uncompressed option?

white balance indandescent
http://bellsouthpwp.net/d/r/drinklime/DSCN0974.JPG

white balance automatic
http://bellsouthpwp.net/d/r/drinklime/DSCN0976.JPG

Yep, its JPG. I messed with curves a bit but I guess I need more practice. Am i just supposed to adjust the Blue channel?

I would approach this by adjusting botht eh Red and the Blue channels.

Click on the bar at the bottom of the graph so that it goes from white on the left to black on the right; this puts the Curves command into asubtractive mode rather than additive mode. (I personally find Subtractive mode easier to use, because I learned color correction in CMYK, not RGB, so working this way seems easier to me.)

In the Red channel, pull down slightly on the midtones. In the Blue channel, push up on the midtones and shadow area.

—
Biohazard? Radiation hazard? SO last-century.
Nanohazard T-shirts now available! http://www.villaintees.com Art, literature, shareware, polyamory, kink, and more:
http://www.xeromag.com/franklin.html

fredrickson wrote:

I took a picture in the sunlight but I had my camera white balance set for incandescent light. What would be the best technique to fix the colors? Everything is shaded blue.

L at these!
http://community.webshots.com/photo/42670345/42670526IIeqQz http://community.webshots.com/photo/38859810/118879751QdfdDW

This is why the professional photographers are so envious of me, because I’m the greatest photograph retoucher around!!!

🙂

Uni

Uni …

fredrickson wrote:

I took a picture in the sunlight but I had my camera white balance set for incandescent light. What would be the best technique to fix the colors? Everything is shaded blue.

L at these!
http://community.webshots.com/photo/42670345/42670526IIeqQz http://community.webshots.com/photo/38859810/118879751QdfdDW
This is why the professional photographers are so envious of me, because I’m the greatest photograph retoucher around!!!

🙂

Uni

Crap uni
nikki

nikki wrote:

Uni …

fredrickson wrote:

I took a picture in the sunlight but I had my camera white balance set for incandescent light. What would be the best technique to fix the colors? Everything is shaded blue.

L at these!
http://community.webshots.com/photo/42670345/42670526IIeqQz http://community.webshots.com/photo/38859810/118879751QdfdDW
This is why the professional photographers are so envious of me, because I’m the greatest photograph retoucher around!!!

🙂

Uni

I do Crap uni

Good for you.

🙂

Uni

nikki

I’m probably in a minority here but I’ve never got to grips with curves, finding them too diffifcult for fine adjustments – I mean, that tiny little graph thing – how you meant to get precise changes with that ? Levels I like better. Also selective colour adjustments on an adjustment layer can work.

But that’s only me.

Alan.

On Wed, 21 Apr 2004 01:22:59 -0400, "fredrickson" wrote:

I took a picture in the sunlight but I had my camera white balance set for incandescent light. What would be the best technique to fix the colors? Everything is shaded blue.

I’m probably in a minority here but I’ve never got to grips with curves, finding them too diffifcult for fine adjustments – I mean, that tiny little graph thing – how you meant to get precise changes with that ? Levels I like better.

If the graph is too small for you, click on the maximize widget in the Curves dialog box. And Curves is more precise than Levels–Levels lets you move the midpoints and endpoints, but how can you use Levels to, say, increase contrast only in the quartertones of an image? You can’t.

The fact is, Curves is the most powerful general-purpose color correction tool; if you don’t ever use it, you’re ignoring a great deal of Photoshop’s power.

—
Biohazard? Radiation hazard? SO last-century.
Nanohazard T-shirts now available! http://www.villaintees.com Art, literature, shareware, polyamory, kink, and more:
http://www.xeromag.com/franklin.html

From: (Alan Walker)

I’m probably in a minority here but I’ve never got to grips with curves, finding them too diffifcult for fine adjustments – I mean, that tiny little graph thing – how you meant to get precise changes with that ?

In the bottom-right corner click the box to grow the Curves plot to 256 pixels, which helps see things better.

To place a point *precisely* just hold down the Ctrl key while clicking in the image where you wish to sample and a point will be added to the curve. If you’re having problems hitting the exact right point then I suggest adding Color Sampler point and leaving the Info palette open so you can move the cursor to where you get the same readings as in your Sampler point.

To move this point precisely on the curve put your cursor in the "Output" box in the lower-left corner and use the up/down arrow keys to move one increment or shift-up/down to move 10 increments. This gives you very precise control.

Levels I like better.

Levels is much more intuitive due to the graph and I’m sure most of us learned Levels first. But think of it this way … with Levels you can move three points on the curve, the two endpoints and the middle point. With Curves you can move these same three points plus 253 others, giving you much greater control. Especially in the quarter-tones, curves are a necessity for fine-tuning.

Anyone doing much graphics work will benefit from learning how to use Curves, I feel.

But that’s only me.

I think the majority of casual users (and not a few serious users) feel the same as you, but I also think Curves are worth learning.

Bill

Uni …

nikki wrote:

Uni …

fredrickson wrote:

I took a picture in the sunlight but I had my camera white balance set for incandescent light. What would be the best technique to fix the colors? Everything is shaded blue.

L at these!
http://community.webshots.com/photo/42670345/42670526IIeqQz http://community.webshots.com/photo/38859810/118879751QdfdDW
This is why the professional photographers are so envious of me, because I’m the greatest photograph retoucher around!!!

You’re a legend in your own mind.
nikki

Uni

Crap uni

Good for you.

🙂

Uni – my name is also my IQ

nikki

nikki wrote:

Uni …

nikki wrote:

Uni …

fredrickson wrote:

I took a picture in the sunlight but I had my camera white balance set for incandescent light. What would be the best technique to fix the colors? Everything is shaded blue.

L at these!
http://community.webshots.com/photo/42670345/42670526IIeqQz http://community.webshots.com/photo/38859810/118879751QdfdDW
This is why the professional photographers are so envious of me, because I’m the greatest photograph retoucher around!!!

You’re a legend in your own mind.

If you feel you can do better, post your work.

🙂

What’s that, you haven’t any?

🙂

Figures.

🙂

Uni

nikki

Uni

Crap uni

Good for you.

🙂

Uni – my name is also my IQ

nikki

In article <r%Chc.40529$>, fredrickson wrote:

Anyway here are the photos if anyone else wants to try. Its a Nikon Coolpix 2100 by the way, can it do RAW?

I think it can with the russian hack to enable it in debug mode.

Is that just the 1600×1200 uncompressed option?

No. RAW is storing the raw sensor data. So things like white balance and other stuff can be delayed until you are at the computer

Uni …

nikki wrote:

Uni …

nikki wrote:

Uni …

fredrickson wrote:

I took a picture in the sunlight but I had my camera white balance set for incandescent light. What would be the best technique to fix the colors? Everything is shaded blue.

Uni-my name is also my IQ wrote:

L at these!
http://community.webshots.com/photo/42670345/42670526IIeqQz http://community.webshots.com/photo/38859810/118879751QdfdDW
This is why the professional photographers are so envious of me, because I’m the greatest photograph retoucher around!!!

You’re a legend in your own mind.

If you feel you can do better, post your work.

🙂

What’s that, you haven’t any?

🙂

Figures.

🙂

Uni

Uni – my name is also my IQ

From the looks of your pictures, it looks like you have some pretty powerful clients. Did your mom like her pictures?

nikki

In the bottom-right corner click the box to grow the Curves plot to 256 pixels, which helps see things better.

And don’t forget to ALT-click in the grid iteself to tighten the grid…

nikki wrote:

Uni …

If you guys spent have as much time trimming your posts properly as you do sniping at each other perhaps you’d actually have a post worth reading…